Page 32 of Tristan’s Temptation

Hell!

Tristan rang the bell again in a staccato fashion and was gratified to hear Bosco let out a series of barks and growls, his nails scratching against the door. That would bring them. Wouldn’t it?

And then he heard her voice—music to his ears. “Bos!” she called. “Stop that.” Tristan smiled as he noted a change in the tenor of her voice. She was coming closer.

The door opened and she was there, bending slightly to hold on to Bosco’s collar as he attempted to leap on the intruder. She was there and, thank God, fully dressed. He’d arrived in time to stop any illicit behavior. His feral grin widened.

“Hey, Shannon.”

“Tristan?” Her lovely brow quirked upward, the British form of surprise. “What are you doing here?”

He leaned against the jamb. “Just came by to see how you’re doing.”

“I have company,” she hissed, throwing a glance over her shoulder into the living room. Good. They were still in the living room.

“Great!” He pushed past her into the foyer, reaching down to scratch Bosco behind the ears. “Can’t wait to meet him.” Ignoring her frown, he strode down the hall. She sighed as she closed the front door and followed.

The scene before him was pleasing in the extreme. The man of the evening—Shannon’s date—was seated on the sofa studying a Scrabble board.

Scrabble.

They were playing Scrabble.

“Who was it, Shan?” her date said in a distracted voice. When he turned his head and saw Tristan, his nostrils flared.

Shannon caught up and stepped between them to make introductions. At least that’s what Tristan assumed. If she knew the extent of what was going on in his gut, she’d be stepping between them to keep Tristan from ripping someone’s way-too-handsome face off.

“Tristan, this is my friend Steve Olsen. Steve-o, this is Tristan Trillo.”

Steve—Steve-o—stood and Tristan was irritated that he was very tall, much taller than Tristan. He was also much, much prettier than Tristan, with long sweeping lashes and a thick shock of hair with a little Elvis curl right in front. From his great height, he gave Tristan an assessing look. But it wasn’t the assessing look of a man sizing up the competition. It was the look of a man sizing up a potential conquest.

Then Steve-o smiled.

“My heavenly God.” He fanned himself with one hand, apparently in raptures. “You aren’t the Tristan Trillo, are you? I’ve heard so much about you. Shannon practically gushes.”

“Is that so?” Tristan smiled at Shannon, a sly, knowing smile.

All right. It was a smirk.

She crossed her arms over her chest and muttered something under her breath.

“Totally.” Steve-o ignored this byplay. I’ve heard about it all. The late nights, the long projects.” He grinned and leaned in. “You’re quite the slave driver.” He laughed at his own private joke and picked up his wineglass to take a sip. “It’s poetic that you two are now an item.”

“We are not an item!” Shannon blurted, glaring at them both in turn.

“You’re a something,” Steve purred. “And it’s so romantic.”

“Brother.”

“I mean, she’s been crazy for you for—”

“Steve!” Shannon’s ejaculation halted the sentence much sooner than Tristan would have liked. Still, the prospect set his pulse racing. Shannon was crazy about him? And had been for…how long? As long as he’d been mooning over her?

Could it be that they’d been wrapped in a web of mutual lust for years, never knowing the other was sitting on the other side of a flimsy glass partition trying desperately to corral lustful urges?

Steve rolled his eyes. “You heteros,” he sniffed. “Everything has to be so furtive. So many games.”

“What do you mean?” There were no games between them. Were there?